Hunting pressured bucks...

[bigbore442001]

My dad and I will be hunting Thanksgiving morning in southern New Hampshire. We have always gone out as part of tradition. As a rule,we've hunted at a small farm in Connecticut but this year the landowner said that the family will be hunting on Thanksgiving as well as that weekend.

So the only other place to hunt is southern New Hampshire. It will be a lot tougher in that the area will be bucks only.NH has a policy where you can shoot antlerless deer on certain days depending on the hunting zone. By now the whole state is bucks only and they have been pushed around a bit( actually pushed around a lot)

So. What would you recommend for tactics ? Any tips would be appreciated.

[longwinters]

Look in the thickest nastiest places you can find.  I imagine that your rut is over by now.  But still if you can find the does you will have a good chance at a buck.  

Long

[riddleofsteel]

In late season, after the primary rut, concentrate on food and cover. Deer will instinctively seek cover that is not disturbed. Trouble is a buck can hide in a patch of weeds a rabbit would feel naked in. Man drives thru dense cover can be productive if you have enough hunters and know the escape routes in your hunting area. Experience is the teacher here, we have killed deer during late season drives in the same palces so often we know where to place standers and what areas to drive.
I mostly kill late season deer in concentrated food areas such as field margins with corn, peanuts, ect. remaining on the edges of fields. Also planted wildlife patches and corn piles (if legal) can be real winners at dust and dawn.
Late season also is a great time to do still hunting after a rain or in soft snow. Moving slowly thru deer woods and along field margins I have spotted many deer bedded down in thickets or just standing in dense cover motionless. Spend more time looking and listening than moving, it works.

[KYsquirrelsniper]

My tactic is pretty much the same as Long's, I go to the thickest, brushiest place I can find. If it's located in a good wind-break, that's even better. Once I've found the general area, I just try to find the trails they're using going in and out of the cover. Preferably, I like to watch where two trails cross or come together in the cover, but if I can't find that, I just pick the trail that I feel best about and watch it. Often you can't see over 30yds in these kinds of places, but just be careful of the wind direction, be very quiet, don't move unless you truly have to, and pay attention because they'll sneak up on you before you realize they're there.

[Glanceblamm]

Agree with all answers and thought to throw in a perspective from a Coyote hunters point of view.
Have seen several times where that big boy will want to bed where it can see well in one direction and be able to smell where it can't see so well.
This places him on the downwind side of the thick cover and there is not much chance of getting in place in that cover without being detected.

If you are careful and start early making sure to stay in place, that open area weather it be pasture or field may contain a boundry marker such as a tree or weed grown post or perhaps even a fence line that may provide a suitable blind.
This open area will have to provide some type of a food source (picked corn in my area) and the buck will come out late and wont stay real long.

I do hunt deer and have taken 18 w/blk-pwder and this year used the .45 Vaquero for a first with a handgun. :grin:
Seems like I have gained the most observation experience while coyote hunting though.